Homecoming
by SepticLovebite
Summary: They hadn't found anyone else. They were in their second winter with just the two of them, him and Beth. It was a winter that was spent mostly in silence.


Author's Notes: So um, hey! It's been awhile. This rambles a lot. It has no direction and pretty much sucks. But I can't tweak it anymore. Gonna call it as it is and work harder on the next one. Or try to at least. I just don't think I have anything worthwhile to write anymore!

* * *

They hadn't found anyone else. They were in their second winter with just the two of them, him and Beth. It was a winter that was spent mostly in silence.

She hadn't been quiet that first day. Beth sobbed and cried. So many tears that Daryl worried she'd drown in them. He'd had to snap at her, to get her to stay quiet long enough for them to be able to skirt around a herd of walkers they'd have no hope of escaping otherwise.

It had gotten to the hottest part of summer, so hot it was hard for them both to move around when the sun was at it's hottest. That's when they'd gotten real quiet, the pair of them. A whole day could pass without a word spoken. That's when they'd run into Sam.

The guy had been a walking disaster from the very first moment they'd met him and any suspicions about his intent immediately dissipated when they watch him try to fight off a walker by throwing golf balls at it. He was an idiot, but he was was an idiot who knew stuff that meant something.

Knew about the prison. Knew about the sickness. Knew about a nice lady with short greying hair who fixed up his busted shoulder. And on his wrist, a man's watch that Daryl had seen a thousand times.

So he knew Sam told the truth.

Daryl hadn't let himself think of Carol more than anyone else who they'd been torn apart from. Couldn't afford to think only of her. Not with Beth desperate for her sister, not when he had no idea if those kids from the prison were with someone who could take care of them. Besides, they had nothing. They lived from hour to hour, meal to meal.

But when Sam told him his story, Daryl made him take them to the quiet little suburb he met Carol and Rick. There were no signs of her. Nothing to track. No breadcrumbs to follow. Carol was gone.

By that first winter on their own, Sam had gotten bit. It was just the two of them again. They got quiet once more.

The odd pair were always on the hunt for the rest of their family. They avoided everyone else if they could, just focused on the people they loved. They couldn't risk strangers. Couldn't trust anyone but each other.

By the time the first frost of their second winter alone hit, Daryl was reconsidering that position. Maybe it was time to accept that everyone else was dead. That it would always be just him and Beth. Unless they took the leap into trusting someone else.

Beth, she needed people. Not to defend her, no, the girl could hold her own, had absolutely no choice since the prison. She could map read now. Could scavenge, could even track a little bit. But she needed someone to talk to. People like Beth needed others to survive. So did he, Daryl supposed.

Nineteen months after fleeing the prison with Beth, he heard a sound he'd never expected to hear again. Not at the edge of Deere forest, anyhow.

The squeal of a child rung into the air. Once, short and sharp. Daryl almost mistook it for an animal. Then, a peal of girlish laughter, happy and carefree. The same voice as the first, he was sure.

He turned to Beth, who looked at him, wide-eyed and her breath held and they both wordlessly turned to the direction the sound came from.

Another ring of laughter came, suddenly cut off and seconds later, he heard another voice. Deeper. Male. Adult. Too quiet for the words to be understood.

He wanted to run through the thick clump of trees blocking their view. He stopped himself as he took the first step. Remembered that they had to take it slow. Whoever had a kid would be protective and rushing in would do nothing to help. Besides, even people with kids could be bad.

There were tracks everywhere, in those few feet separating them. Small footprints, one that definitely matched the voice, judging by the size. A man's, a large man's at that. More smaller ones, various sizes.

"What we gon' say?" Beth's whisper was rough from lack of use, her first words to him since yesterday. And then it had only been to tell him she was going to the bathroom.

"Nothin'. Gonna watch. Find out about 'em first." He told her as they reached the clearing, a cottage built right in the middle of it. It was a funny little thing, the roof patched with materials that didn't seem to match the rest. Boards on most of the windows, a little roped off vegetable patch. Around the edge of the clearing, barbed wire wrapped around each of the trees, blocking any Walkers, he assumed by the chunks of flesh wrapped around the piece just an arm's length ahead of them.

They stood amongst the trees in silence. Tried to ignore the biting cold as the winter sun disappeared behind the green, watched for signs of life in the little house. He thought at least an hour had passed and was about to suggest that they go make camp somewhere nearby for the night, try again in the morning, when a walker bounced into the barbed wire that was right across from them in the clearing.

It has spotted them too, judging by the manner in which it pushed itself harder into the cottage's defenses, flesh and fabric catching on the small spikes.

Less than a couple of minutes later, the door to the cottage opened and a woman with a dark ponytail stood on the porch, shrugging on a jacket. The light was poor, too poor to see her face.

"Nah, I got it, it's just a loner." The woman called back into the house, picking up the shovel against the wall and striding up to the walker and felling it with one hard whack to the temple. It fell against the barbed wire and the woman used the tip of the shovel to push it back to the ground.

"Now?" Beth breathed at him. Her hand was at his elbow, tugging on his jacket sleeve.

Before he could tell her to wait, the door creaked once more and a child sized bullet came running out.

"Lemme!" She wore a coat that was far too big for her, making her look even more like the itty bitty thing she was. Her brown feathery hair blew back into the wind and she clutched a small baseball bat in both hands. The hem of her coat got caught under her feet and she tumbled to the ground. But the little girl did not cry. She barely even hit the dirt, just pushed herself up and kept going, until the dark haired woman caught her, swooping her under her arm and heading straight for the house.

"_Judith!_"

That one word just about had both Daryl and Beth toppling over with shock.

There was a girl standing on the porch, hands on her hips, looking at the little girl - _Judith_ - with irritation. She wasn't a woman by any stretch of the imagination, barely even a teen.

"Lizzie, keep hold of this kid when the door is open, yeah?" The woman called up to Lizzie, Lizzie who they'd known from before, looking like she always had, except for the fact that the girl was looking like a giraffe, far taller than Daryl had imagined she could ever grow.

Judith was dumped unceremoniously onto the porch and the toddler darted back into the cottage.

"Daryl, what are we waitin' for? _Judith and Lizzie!_" Beth started to move from her cover behind the thick clump of trees and Daryl jerked her back.

"Alright, we gonna do it. Take it slow, yeah? We found two of our kids but we don't know that woman."

The door was shut on the cottage by the time they'd found a way through the barbed wire without damaging it. All the windows bar one were boarded up, a soft light burning behind the drawn curtains.

He tugged his crossbow over his shoulder. Didn't want to seem threatening. Beth looked at him one last time and stepped up to the porch and knocked it quickly, stepping back to stand beside him, giving him a grin.

The light inside was snuffed out instantly. There was scuffling inside and he could hear footsteps on wood just inside the door.

In those few seconds, where Daryl guessed that whoever was on the other side of the door was preparing for an attack, he could feel the excitement vibrating off of Beth. He hadn't seen her like this in forever, so happy she was bouncing off the ground.

"Lizzie!" She blurted out, one hand cupped around her mouth. "It's Beth!"

All motion behind the door ceased. Then, they watched as the brass knob twisted slowly, the door cracking open. The first thing he saw was the wrong end of a gun, pointed in their direction. Then, a second, before the door pulled back completely and his eyes slid into focus to see exactly who was standing behind it.

The woman he didn't know stood at the front, her gun pointed low, at his chest. But he wasn't concerned by her. No, he was far more concerned to see the man standing next to her, a good head and shoulders taller, wearing the same hat that he wore the last time Daryl saw him.

"_Tyreese!_" Beth practically squealed and a split second later, Tyreese was pushed aside by two others, who practically tackled Beth to the floor. Lizzie and Mika were as excitable as ever, smothering Beth and forcing her to her knees to hug them properly.

It was too much. How could little kids have survived? Nineteen months since the massive hole was blown into their lives and _other people had made it._

He watched Judith push her way between the two adults in the doorway to watch the scene in front of her, slack jawed and wide eyed. Her fingers came up to toy with a stray piece of her hair around her ear and she turned her gaze onto him, looking at him in the unabashed way that only children could.

"I don' know you." She declared in her lispy drawl, pulling her hand from her hair to point her finger at him.

And he didn't know her either. Not this Judith. This Judith whose hair had darkened since he last saw her. This Judith who walked and talked and didn't know he was the first person to feed her when she was born. The first person to give her a nickname.

"Daryl." He was snatched from his thoughts by Tyreese's approaching form, reaching out and grasping his hand with a big smile. His knees went weak and he was sure he'd rub his eyes and they'd all disappear, like some kind of dream. As if the other man knew, Tyreese tugged him forward by the hand, trapped him a bear hug that nearly had him balancing on his tip toes.

"Come on, let's get in quick, 'fore the biters hear us." Tyreese let him go and took the back pack from his shoulder. "Come on, Ju, let's get Daryl and Beth inside."

Judith still gazed up at him, mouthing his name to herself and he was pretty sure she had heard the word before, because now she was looking at him like he was Santa Claus or something.

He still hadn't said a word. Couldn't find them. Beth went ahead of him, Mika and Lizzie clutching a hand each as she reached the door, she squealed and jumped, throwing herself at whoever was in front of them and even though he couldn't see that person, he knew,_ just knew_, who it was.

It was like a siren going off, or perhaps like he'd caught a whiff of her scent, but somehow, sensing her presence was easy as had it been when he saw her last time.

The kids tumbled through the doorway, Tyreese too and suddenly, it was just the two of them again. Him and her.

"Hey." She stood squarely in the doorway, arms crossed over her chest. Her wasn't too much longer than when he'd last seen her, definitely shorter than his, which would could easily rival Beth's in the ponytail stakes these days. She wore it pushed off her face with a bandana, the ends of the knot sticking out of her head like a pair of bat ears. Still had her boots, fighting boots, she'd called them once.

"Hey." He replied, could barely choke it out, and it was with that one word, that all of Carol's front crumbled and she hurled herself towards him, forcing him back against the frame of the porch, his crossbow clattering awkwardly and she almost took the air from his lungs, her grip around him was so tight.

"I knew I would see you again. _I knew it_." She half-sobbed into his neck and still he couldn't do anything more than clumsily rub her back with one hand.

Carol sensed his awkwardness. It had been so long since he'd touched anyone. He and Beth, there'd been this distance. A way of protecting themselves if they lost the other. And even before - in the prison - he'd only just began to get used to the casual touching that everyone seemed to engage in. Only was just learning how to reciprocate it.

So she pulled back, gave him a watery smile and blinked back the tears that threatened to spill and nodded at him. "I'm so glad to see you." Her hand came up to touch his hair. "Think it's about time you had that hair cut I was always threatening."

Before they could say any more, they were swept up in the melee inside.

* * *

It took hours for them to share their stories. Carol had stumbled across the young dark haired woman, Sarah, on the same day she'd come across Tyreese and the children on the train tracks, two days after the prison attack.

Tyreese had filled her in on what happened. They'd spent a couple of nights in and around the prison, looking for a sign of anymore survivors. They'd found the prison bus, crashed and filled with dead bodies. They stopped looking after that, the children had been too distraught. By the end of that week, they'd found the cottage, realised they couldn't to and fro with the baby and the children. They'd never seen another living person until he and Beth showed up.

It wasn't until he'd finished his meal - fresh from their little vegetable patch, mixed in with some tinned ham - that he remembered. Remembered why Carol had needed to Tyreese to fill her in. What Rick told him she'd done.

He couldn't believe Tyreese knew. Couldn't, not with the way he was so easy around her, smiling and laughing. He'd never told Beth. Didn't believe that it was as Rick told him and certainly didn't want to cement it as fact by telling somebody else.

The cottage had two bedrooms and it seemed Tyreese and Sarah were getting cosy, seeing as they shared one of them. The children and Carol had been in the other, but Carol had given up her bed for Beth.

Judith had watched him from the floor as Carol had pulled out sheets and blankets for them both for the couch in the living room. She'd taken to Beth right away, maybe there was some part of her subconscious that recognised that the girl had been her primary caregiver in her first few months of life. But she watched him like a hawk, like she wanted to say something but didn't know how.

"Judith, time for bed, go on." Carol had nudged her into the hallway, the little girl's feet slapping on the tile.

"Hey, you know my daddy?" She'd asked him over her shoulder.

"Yeah, I know your daddy." He told her, sitting down on the worn couch that would be his bed for the night.

"Oh." Judith shrugged and sauntered off, like she'd only asked him if he liked peas or if the sky was blue.

"She's not normally this quiet. I think she'd overwhelmed by you." Carol explained, handing him a pillow and settling down on the opposite couch. "We've talked about you a lot. It's a big thing to have your stories come to life when you're only two."

Daryl grunted.

"Did you ever find anyone?" She asked him, toeing off her shoes.

"Met a guy named Sam."

"Got bit?" Carol asked. Like it could be any different. They always got bit.

He nodded and leaned back to reach into his front pocket. Pulled out the watch that Sam had worn, the one he had to prise off his wrist before he turned. He set it on the coffee table that lay between them and Carol stared down at it and swallowed audibly.

"What did he tell you?" She wasn't talking about Sam, they didn't need to say the name of the person she meant.

"Did you do it?"

"Is that what Rick told you?" She looked almost angry with him, like he had some cheek for asking her.

"Tell me."

"Rick isn't a liar, Daryl." She picked up the watch and turned it over in her hand, looked back at him with uneasy eyes.

"Yeah, but I didn't have you down for one neither. But you must be, 'cause Tyreese don't know shit." He snatched the watch from her and tucked into the pocket of his bag.

"You think if I told him what I told Rick, he'd let me take care of those kids? Tyreese wouldn't have lasted another day with the baby and the girls. They were starving when I found them. I couldn't let them all die." Her voice was trembling, but her eyes were hard and Carol looked at him like she was daring him to tell her different. "I'd never planned to keep that secret until now, you know? You're right, I'm not a liar." Carol shrugged. "It just got harder. We had fight to get ourselves on our feet. What would it have achieved? I figured if he didn't know..." She let out a sigh and rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hand. "It wouldn't bring Karen back. He has Sarah now and he's happy. As relatively happy as he can be. Telling Rick what I did, it had to be done."

She got up to tug the curtains a little tighter together and when she came back to the centre of the room, she chose to sit on the coffee table in front of him. "I'm sorry." Carol reached out her hand and touched his cheek, her palm warm on his skin. "I'm so sorry." She rubbed her thumb along his cheek and this time, he wanted the touch, pushed his face into it.

She couldn't have killed those sick people. Not her. Carol would never have just killed people like that. He just couldn't believe it.

Then he realised, it didn't even matter. He trusted her. If she did it, she did it because it was what was right. That was enough for him. If they ever found Rick again, they'd deal with it. He'd deal with it the way he'd wanted to back at the prison. And he wasn't getting separated from her again. This was his home and she was in it.

Her hand fell away and she slid back over to her own couch, drew the blankets up to her chest and watched him settle down himself.

It wasn't until he heard her deep rhythmic breathing and her arm went slack on her stomach, that he realised Carol hadn't even answered his question at all.


End file.
